


He was my North, my South, my East and West

by starvessel



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Angst, Coping, Crying, Grieving, M/M, Panic Attacks, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, before he would actually start to grieve, but then i realised he would try to push it down first, i was very sad we didn't see paul grieve, more or less, or rather not coping in this case, post s01e15, so yes here's the thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-18 13:43:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13682877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starvessel/pseuds/starvessel
Summary: Being a soldier means to deal with loss, he thinks, to carry on even when people are dying left and right, because it's the only thing to do to stay alive yourself.He isn't a soldier, just an astromycologist.He isn't a soldier, but carrying on like one he can do.---Paul doesn't grieve. Until he does.





	He was my North, my South, my East and West

**Author's Note:**

> I'm actually not a trekkie and I didn't know any of the terminology or details of this universe yet, but I desperately wanted to contribute so I tried to look up a lot of things for accuracy. Disco is the first series I watched (I only saw the Chris Pine films before) so I hope my basic understanding of the universe is adequate.  
> Feel free to correct me on any mistakes and I will fix them to perfect the story.
> 
> I tried to make this somewhat artful-ish, because I'm very emotional about these two after the finale and was inspired by the poem 'Funeral Blues' by W H Auden. Another inspiration was the Achilles/Patroclus relationship in which [spoilers] Achilles does not want to hold a funeral for Patroclus when he dies, because he can't bear to let his lover go and cries over his dead body for multiple days. Yeah, that was an inspiration, bear that in mind while reading haha.  
> I felt like our Paul Stamets might be the kind of person to do that too.

_He was my North, my South, my East and West,_  
_My working week and my Sunday rest,_  
_My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;_  
_I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong._  
  
_The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,_  
_Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,_  
_Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;_  
_For nothing now can ever come to any good._

_\- from **Funeral Blues** by W H Auden_

★★★

 

He was prepared for it, but then when it happened, he wasn’t at all.

He knew that they weren’t immortal, but he thought if somebody was to die first it would surely be him, because he has always been reckless and arrogant and sometimes unbearably mean. Unlike Hugh, his counterpart, who has always been nothing but kind, beautiful and bright.

Therefore, he never thought that Hugh might leave first, because Hugh deserved so much and Paul thought that even the universe would not wrong a man as ethereal as Hugh Culber.

Being a soldier means to deal with loss, he thinks, to carry on even when people are dying left and right, because it’s the only thing to do to stay alive yourself.  
He isn’t a soldier, just an astromycologist. He isn’t a soldier, but carrying on like one he can do. Actually, it is the only way he knows how to deal with this anyway, because he knows that as soon as he would stop to breathe for a moment, he would lose all grip on life. So he carries on.

They give him a medal and they give Hugh one too, although it feels unfair, like the Federation is trying to make up for something they had done to him. Still it doesn’t quite reach. It is, of course, the only thing they can do for him, after all. But for Paul it is just another reminder that his love isn’t there anymore, that Hugh wasn’t rewarded and saved but rather brutally murdered and then rewarded for a sacrifice he was never supposed to be forced into.

Michael’s speech is touching and they all get promoted, but when Paul holds the cold steel of the medal of honor in his hand none of that matters and it is enough to make him feel like he is going to break down any moment in front of the entire room, if he won’t be able to leave soon.

 

They all plan to go out to celebrate afterwards, except for Paul, who decides to stay behind.  
‘Are you sure you don’t want to come with us?’ Tilly asks him, shortly after the ceremony.  
Earlier he felt like crying, in fact, he had been close to crying, but now he feels nothing at all. With both his and Hugh’s medal buried deep inside his pants pocket, it all feels unreal and far away. Everyone else is wearing their medal still, except for him.

‘I’m sure.’ Paul doesn’t mind the celebration of a victory, but he’d just rather not feel anything at all for now. No emotions, neither negative nor positive. It feels wrong to be celebrating now, too.  
‘Alright, that’s okay. I can’t even imagine what you must go through right now.’  
‘Good night, Tilly,’ he simply tells her and leaves without another word.

That night he can’t sleep. No tears come, it is almost odd. Paul has asked for different quarters for himself tonight, because returning to his and Hugh’s quarters seems unbearable. Nobody had commented on it, they had simply assigned him to a different room after he’d asked.

When he looks outside the window now, the stars are bright and wonderful. Like the night isn’t affected by Hugh’s death at all. Of course, it isn’t. Hugh was Paul’s center of the universe, but nobody else’s.

He does not want to see the stars now.  
He closes the curtains.

 

‘Do you want to hold a funeral for him?’  
‘No, I don’t.’  
‘You don’t? I think it might be a good idea to find peace with-‘  
‘And I think it might be a good idea to leave me alone. We’re not holding a funeral.’  
Michael lowers her gaze, her face sad, ashamed, sorrowful.  
‘Then at least a memorial service. He was our friend too, you know. I understand we all grieve differently, but some people need to be able to find their peace with this.’

Paul just leaves then, walks back to the still opened science project on his computer which he has started to distract his mind with.  
It has been four days now, still he hasn’t cried and still he sleeps in room 3F 82, a clean and white environment. Sanitary and neutral. He hasn’t been very hungry lately and keeps forgetting to eat if he’s being honest. Also, he’s had a massive headache since yesterday, maybe he should get that checked sometime.

On the bright side, nobody has really approached him in the last few days, except for a few brave souls who thought he wouldn’t lash out at them, or didn’t mind. Like Michael. She doesn’t follow him now, though, when he leaves.

 

Six days later and Paul pokes around in his rice with little interest, while he’s reading an article on his PADD. His headache is still there, he commed for somebody from sickbay to check on him in his temporary new quarters, but the first thing the woman who knocked on his door said was: ‘Lieutenant Commander, I didn’t know you had asked for new quarters. It must be very hard for you, then. To return to your old life. I’m very sorry, Hugh was such a good man.’ He had slammed the door right in her face, his head rattling with the pain the loud noise had caused.

So now he just hopes the headache will go away by itself, as he won’t go to sickbay himself, either. He can’t bear to.

 

‘You look terrible.’  
Raising his gaze, Paul looks up to see Tilly sitting opposite from him. Funnily enough, he hasn’t actually heard her approach or even sit down.  
‘Thanks, Ensign, but I am perfectly fine.’  
‘Where’s your medal, though?’ The fork clatters onto Paul’s plate as he angrily drops it, even though it was just a question asked out of curiosity. Everyone has been wearing their medal, they all agreed to collectively wear them for a week. Well, collectively except for Paul. It felt like a burden for him to wear it, to even look at his medal – both medals – now. He had put them into the lowest drawer in his new quarters.

‘It’s in my quarters,’ he says and looks back to his PADD, ignoring how Tilly is staring at him. She should understand why he can’t wear it.  
‘I heard you’ve changed quarters.’  
‘Yes.’  
‘Is it hard to return to the place Medical Officer Culber used to live in, on your own?’  
Paul flinches, unwillingly, then freezes because, why did he flinch? This is reality now. People will keep on addressing it, no matter whether he wants to hear it or not.  
‘Tilly I’d rather you leave me alone now-‘  
‘Lieutenant Commander, allow me to say something, please.’  
He stares at her for a moment, eyebrows raised. Suddenly he’s tired, very tired. He was never good with emotions, that was Hugh’s strength. Paul nods reluctantly.

‘We’ve all noticed, you know. You barely eat, you are always on your feet since days, personally I’m not even sure you sleep at all. Excuse me for saying this, but you look horrible. Michael is very worried, you know. We all are.’ Tilly’s eyes are sad and Paul isn’t sure what to say. He isn’t even sure what he’s doing, at this point.  
‘Have you grieved yet?’ Tilly says softly. ‘I mean, grieved properly. You’re just functioning and I think- I think … maybe you should … let yourself grieve. It’s alright to grieve, you know. Your partner just died. Nobody just gets over that in a week. We all understand, you can let it show.’  
The chair scratches loudly against the floor when Paul abruptly stands up and storms off towards his quarters. His old quarters. Hugh’s old quarters. He thinks somebody might be calling after him, possibly Tilly, but there’s a ringing in his ears now and he can’t hear much except for his own heart beating loudly. Suddenly, he feels like he might forget about Hugh, if he doesn’t look at the belongings he left behind right about now. It’s an irrational fear of course, but his head is spinning and there’s cold sweat breaking out on his forehead and neck, his hands shaking when he looks down towards them while walking.  
‘Hugh,’ he whispers, starting into a run. ‘Hugh-‘  
He reaches the door to their shared quarts, opens it as quickly as possible, steps inside. It’s overwhelming. Everything is still there, like it was left. Since Paul was in a coma for a while Hugh must have entered the room a few times on his own, some items have been misplaced from where Paul remembers them to be before he went comatose.

He looks around frantically, like Hugh might actually walk out of the bathroom if he searches for him long enough. There’s a few coffee cups scattered around on the table, multiple PADDS and notes and clothes thrown around the room, despite the fact that Hugh normally kept their room clean and organised. It seems he stayed with Paul in sickbay a lot, instead of cleaning their quarters and Paul feels nauseous, because he is reminded of how warm and lovely and kind his Hugh was, always staying by his side.

To literally clean his mind, he walks up to the coffee cups, having decided to tidy up, because those cups stood here for over a week by now, but as he reaches the table he feels like maybe he shouldn’t clean, after all. He doesn’t want to clean what Hugh has touched. His vision is suddenly blurry, his hands are still shaking and he grips the table to steady himself, gets a sticky note stuck on his hand, tries to shake it off, almost panicked now. When that doesn’t work he peels the note off from his fingers with his other hand. It’s probably a to-do list of some sorts, Hugh did that sometimes, writing lists and then leaving them all over the place. Paul looks down on it now, and it’s not a to-do list.  
‘Good morning my darling, here’s your coffee. Well, the coffee isn’t actually in the cup yet, but I decided to put the cup here so you wouldn’t forget the coffee in the first place. You’re insufferable without your coffee in the morning, so I’m just reminding you, my love. Don’t be too angry at me, you know I just want your best. See you later.’

Paul’s legs give away then, his vision swimming. There’s tears now, he can feel them, although he hadn’t realised he was crying until now. They fall onto the note in his hands and the writing gets washed-up.  
‘No … no no no-‘ Sobbing, he tries to frantically dry off the paper, but he just smears the ink around. His breathing rate increases rapidly and suddenly he feels like he can’t get any air into his lungs anymore.  
‘Hugh,’ he calls out, his voice breaking. He realises the coffee message is barely readable anymore and that’s when he starts to scream. It’s a broken noise, choked by tears and shortness of breath, forceful still and bone-shattering. It doesn’t help though, he feels like he’s losing his sanity, like he might fall through the floor and be swallowed by a black hole. He keeps screaming, his body curling towards the floor, tears falling as the note falls out of his grip.

When somebody carefully touches his back he lashes out, starts hitting around maniacally, because it’s not Hugh anymore who touches him softly like this, he won’t, ever again.  
Michael catches his forearms, while Tilly gets down to them on the floor. Paul is still screaming, tears streaming.

He barely registers being forced into a hug, just claws at Michael’s back like his life depends on it. At this point, it might. He has never lived for himself. Ever since he met Hugh, he has only lived for him, just for him. So now that Hugh isn’t here anymore to show Paul where to walk in the darkness, he thinks he might lose his way and never find back to the light.


End file.
